LIEBERMAN, OBAMA, ISRAEL, SHERIFF CLARK

In a Supefecta box. Whatever. These are your interesting stories from the past weekend.

By now, everyone's either heard or seen Lieberman's appearance last Sunday on Face The Nation with Bob Schieffer. It's all out there now, isn't it? He's advocating a ground invasion of Iran or air strikes or god knows what. Americans seem to think war is some kind of game or joke or sport. Fair enough for the goyim. But shouldn't the Jewish Face Of America, the would-be vice-president, the would-be president who promised he would not work on shabbos know better? De judio humanista, Kelso no se da cuenta ni de shabbos ni de Jesucristo ni del cielo ni de nada. But...isn't Holy Joe supposed to know better? Never mind a nuclear strike on Iran which would blow the world in two inside a couple of days. Any unprovoked assault on Iran might do the same. And, what Holy Joe, about the millions of Jews in Iran? What about them? Collateral damage, right? 6 million European Jewish ghosts are about to visit a promethean eternity upon Holy Joe. The Night Of The Living Dead, you bastard. Enjoy.

Hold the phone. Lieberman hates video games, right? Kelso's got a great idea for a new XXX-rated video game. Joe Lieberman's Night Of The Living Dead. You get to be the undead of any of the millions killed, maimed, tortured, insane during the 30s and 40s and do whatever you want to an anamatronic Joe Lieberman. Awesome.

Two more repulsive people headed for hell made the news this weekend in a tandem of sorts: Senator Barack Obama and General Colin Powell. Go figure. Colin Powell has been advising Obama on foreign policy. What's Gen. My Lai teaching Obama, anyway? How to hold up a crack vial of talcum powder before the United Nations and declaim the necessity to sacrifice god knows how many American military, Sunni, Shia, Kurds, and -- yes --ultimately even Blackwater mercenaries? No wonder not a single person has commented on this site that Kelso's all wrong about Obama. The case is closed. Powell's going to hell for sure, because as repulsive as his behavior in Vietnam through his service to George W. Bush was, Powell always knew better. His brilliant, downright radically left-wing, 2000 speech before the Republican National Convention proved that. Obama's going to meet Old Scratch, as well. Just on overall douche-baggedness. That's not Kelso's problem. Kelso's going into a pewter cup on someone's mantelpiece. Yet, there are still some naive souls out there in Gringoland who believe that Obama is the left-wing alternative to Hillary Clinton? Ka-ching. If Gore passes this up, Kelso's going to get awfully well betting on Clinton: to win outright, in parlays, in reverses, in the futures, in the synthetics, in challenge bets against friends, in on-line virtual office pools, in on-line fantasy political games. And so on.

As to another Barak. He wins Israeli Labor leadership first ballot small -- 36-31 -- over Ayalon, top Shin Bet dude turned peace-nik. Barak (Carville's man --need to know any more?) keeps his spot in Ohmert's coalition. We like Ayalon here at the Nuts. He may be the best chance to prevent Lieberman from getting the world blown in two. This somehow has a reverse Lamont-Lieberman feel to it. As Labor holds fewer than 15% of the Knesset seats, the PM, Ohmert represents some right-wing party other than Likud and another fascist, Netanyahu, way past his sell-by date, is Likud's guy, even if Barak wins the Labor leadership, Ayalon can cobble together the hidden left-wing majority (as Lieberman cobbled together Connecticut's right-wing majority), and win this thing. Or Ayalon can just smash Barak in the run-off, square off against Netanyahu, and bring Labor back. You want the zeitgeist here: Libby got hit with a very hard sentence. Wolfowitz made an ass of himself. Brooks, Feith, From, Frum, Fuerth and Kristol seem to have disappeared. Perle's digging his bazillions in the South of France. AIPAC's got dough, but like the NRA, is something only true believers proudly claim membership in. The only loud, obnoxious voices are Dershowitz and Lieberman. And as "Jewish" as Dershowitz is, at rock bottom he's a criminal defense lawyer and an American before he's anything else. Looking to take Ayalon here at a big price.

Back to the tortured Lamont/Lieberman analogy. Lamont goofed on something. He suggested that maybe Lieberman's claims about being way into the Civil Rights Movement were maybe something less than true. Lieberman got all pissy and Lamont backed down, perhaps fearing the wrath of State Attorney General Blumenthal who's actually not a bad guy and probably should have challenged Lieberman in the primary instead of backing him in the general. The Connecticut election for Junior United States Senator was a fascinating race in sociological terms. It showed a world-turned-upside-down. An elite, high-church (read: preppy) left versus a Jewish right. Lamont had Howard Dean's support, obviously. Dean's brother James was Lamont's top aide. And the spiritual guru was the late Reverend W. Sloane Coffin, who had been Holy Joe's professor at Yale. And it was Coffin who got off the best line: "Joe's an Orthodox Jew and a Conservative Democrat. I wish he were a Conservative Jew and an Orthodox Democrat." Lamont would not have risked questioning Lieberman's 60s civil rights bona fides to begin with had Coffin not had the goods. Hindshight's 20/20 but Lamont should have risked being called an anti-Semite and fought Lieberman not only on Iraq but also on Lieberman's fudged history and present day racism.

This leads us to another interesting weekend news item that slipped under the radar screen: the death of Sheriff Clark of Edmund Pettus Bridge fame. U.S. Representative John Lewis of Georgia, who took a pretty hard physical beating that day, has said that these days, old veterans of the Civil Rights era, on both the integrationist and segregationist sides often get together for coffee or a beer and talk over old times and even manage a laugh or two. A sort of organic Truth And Reconciliation Commission if you will. At a more serious level, take note of the closeness of the families of Martin Luther King, Jr., and James Earl Ray. But never Sheriff Clark. He was an overt racist until the last. He won't be missed. As time grinds on, Powell and Obama will join him in hell. Make of that what you will.

Kelso's Nuts love you.